Bangi-dong gopchang restaurant with Lotte Tower view seats: Jinseong

My partner and I went looking for a beef gopchang restaurant in Bangi-dong for a date. Bangi-dong is a well-known neighborhood for gopchang restaurants. Among them, the one I visited today was packed with fat, and its house-made kimchi and side dishes were so appealing I just had to write about it.

This place is [Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang Bangi Direct Branch]

• Location: 603m from Jamsil Station Exit 10; public parking nearby
• Hours: Mon–Thu 16:00–23:00 / Fri 16:00–24:00 / Sat 13:00–24:00 / Sun 15:00–24:00

Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang in Bangi-dong: the storefront and the Sunday wait

Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang Bangi Direct Branch sits in Bangi-dong's restaurant alley, and when I went at 6pm on a Sunday I was the first one waiting. The exterior has a clean look — the kind that makes you crave gopchang just looking at it.

Inside Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang: open-air yard seats with a Lotte Tower view

Inside, Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang has plenty of round tables. They opened the windows to create an open-air 'yajang' feel. With Lotte Tower visible outside at a glance —

now that's a setting that makes you want gopchang.

Menu and prices at Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang Bangi Direct Branch

Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang Bangi Direct Branch's menu has exactly three items. Somehow a simple menu feels trustworthy. We ordered as follows.

• Hanwoo gopchang (₩19,000) x2 servings
• Hanwoo daechang (₩19,000) x1 serving
• Kkakdugi yangbap (₩9,000)

Three house-made kimchi and the side dishes

Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang's side dishes come in this order: minari pickled garlic sauce, chives, three kinds of kimchi, and steamed egg. It's generous. The kimchi is altari radish, mustard leaf, and green onion — all house-made, they said (and they sell it too, for reference!). Tasted plain, it's tangy and not sweet — I figured it would pair well with the fatty gopchang.

How the hanwoo gopchang and daechang are grilled at the table

A whole table's worth of gopchang and hanwoo daechang arrived. A solid gopchang setup — the main dish came with rice cake, potato, mung bean sprouts, chives, kimchi, and cabbage on top. The gopchang was pre-grilled once, already a proper golden brown.

They set a 4-minute timer for us. How am I supposed to wait 4 minutes staring at that gopchang.

Grilled so hard it's basically frying.gif

After 4 minutes, the staff cut the gopchang for us. The cut daechang was completely packed inside. Why does watching oil drip off the daechang get me so excited.

One more 3-minute wait before we could eat. Oishikunare, oishikunare (be delicious, be delicious).

♡Done♡ Golden-brown, almost-fried gopchang and daechang. They really grilled it well. The color is so gorgeous.

What the Bangi-dong beef gopchang at Jinseong tastes like

Can you see how packed with fat the gopchang is? The daechang is ridiculously plump too. Grilled until it was almost fried, it was crispy outside and savory-rich inside. I've never had gopchang this savory with zero gamy smell. There are plenty of gopchang restaurants in Bangi-dong, but for fatty, savory gopchang, Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang feels like number one.

I tried the gopchang both with the minari pickled garlic sauce and with the kimchi. Different charm each way — both cut through the gopchang's richness completely. The minari sauce is tangy, sweet, and spicy all at once, with the minari's aroma coming through — it's amazing. Even just picking out the minari and eating it alone is delicious.

Finishing with kkakdugi yangbap (kimchi fried rice)

Right as we finished the gopchang, the kkakdugi yangbap arrived. So many ingredients went into it, it was colorful.

The diced radish kimchi and radish salad paired perfectly with the special cut gopchang. Eating it as dessert after the gopchang left us just the right kind of full.

Verdict and tips for visiting Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang

Jinseong Hanwoo Gopchang Bangi Direct Branch is a standout Bangi-dong gopchang restaurant. The clean exterior and interior make it great for a date. With the Lotte Tower view out the window, the open-air seating has real romance to it. The gopchang and daechang were sooo delicious, and reasonably priced too. You can eat until you're full on just gopchang and daechang. If you're torn between the gopchang restaurants in Bangi-dong, this one won't disappoint.

• There's often a wait. I'd recommend making a reservation!
• For a couple (1 man, 1 woman), ordering what we did — 2 servings hanwoo gopchang + 1 serving hanwoo daechang + kkakdugi yangbap — will leave you full.